Utilized worldwide, the ECHO model (the local iteration is “ECHO Idaho”) is an educational resource empowering healthcare professional in remote or underserved communities to treat complex conditions and disorders with specialist-level expertise. At ECHO Idaho clinicians statewide join via video conferencing for one-hour sessions that include brief lectures, case reviews, resource sharing and discussion. In this way, the ECHO model exponentially increases workforce capacity to provide best practice specialty care and reduce health disparities. 

This is especially important in Idaho’s mental and behavioral health field, as the need for behavioral health treatment is expanding rapidly. ECHO Idaho leverages interdisciplinary panels of mental health experts — including social workers, psychologists, counselors, psychiatrists, psychiatric nurses and pharmacists — to address a broad spectrum of critical mental health topics in Idaho, including behavioral health in primary care, counseling techniques for substance use disorders, pediatric autism spectrum disorder and others. 

Counselors, social workers and other behavioral health providers will learn how to use ECHO Idaho and its low barrier, interdisciplinary approach to increase their own knowledge of resources and expand their capabilities to treat patients.